


Human Interfacing

by speccygeekgrrl



Category: Raised by Wolves (TV 2020)
Genre: Drabble Collection, Gen, Self-Indulgent, Senses
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-05
Updated: 2020-12-05
Packaged: 2021-03-09 19:07:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 606
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27901225
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/speccygeekgrrl/pseuds/speccygeekgrrl
Summary: How Campion experiences the world around him.
Comments: 1
Kudos: 9





	Human Interfacing

**Author's Note:**

> With the caveat that I've only seen up to episode 8 yet, and I don't... actually... _like_ the show.... I felt compelled to write _something_ about Campion and Paul's friendship, since that's about the only character relationship in the show that interests me. 
> 
> So, drabbles based on senses, since that's brief by necessity and broad enough to do something with that spans what I've seen so far. Spoilers through episode 8.

Sight

When Mother comes home with a whole new set of children, Campion barely believes his eyes. He’s lost almost everyone he’s ever cared about; he saw the ark fall, and it’s not a leap to assume that all of these children have just lost everyone they’ve ever cared about, too.

He sees sorrow in their faces, and aches with them; he sees fear, but he’s already fearful of Mother and what she’s done and what she might yet do.

Mother tells him to make his new friends feel at home. Campion isn’t sure he knows what home feels like anymore.

Touch

Mouse is the softest thing that Campion has ever felt in his life. There’s nothing on the planet that feels like a living animal, nothing furry. It’s not like touching another person’s hair, not that Campion’s done much of that in his life either. 

When Paul lets Campion hold Mouse, he sits beside Campion, watching the other boy watching the small creature in his hands. Campion has never felt anything like Mouse before; Paul has never felt anything like Campion before, a person utterly unlike any he’s met, clever and determined and, somehow, shining despite not living in Sol’s light.

Taste

The fungus doesn’t taste like much, but to Campion it tastes like vindication. He refuses to survive by causing death to other living things. It doesn’t matter what Paul tells him, that animals don’t have souls according to Mithraic faith; Kepler 22b doesn’t have anything that Earth had on it, not good animals, not good plants to eat, and maybe since he was born here Campion doesn’t have a soul either. 

“I wonder if I’ll ever taste anything good again,” Paul says ruefully after finishing their first meal of fungus.

Campion’s never tasted anything good; he only eats to live.

Scent

Being locked in the silo by the Mithraic invaders is the worst experience of Campion’s life so far. He’s surrounded by radioactive roots and his only company is the rotting corpse of a creature whose death he mourned and the whispers of his long-dead siblings. He can’t get the stench out of his nose, can’t get his nose close enough to a window to breathe anything but death.

Paul calls out to him, barely audible, and Campion breathes through his mouth and tries to remember sitting next to him to talk: woodsmoke from the fire, the scent of human sweat.

Sound

“Campion? Can you hear me?”

The sound of Paul’s voice coming through the earpiece sends emotions through Campion that he can’t sort out: relief, surprise, joy, nervousness, all tangled up together and shot through with golden light. “Yes,” he says, “I can hear you.”

“Good. I know how to get you out of there.”

Campion isn’t surprised that Paul’s plan is the same as his plan except better. He’s gone back and forth so many times over whether he hates Paul for being more clever than him or loves him for turning that cleverness toward improving the world around him.

Feeling

Campion claws his way out of the ground and takes a deep shuddery breath, spits dirt, and takes shelter against the silo he’s just escaped from. He feels incandescent with rage and fear, absolutely burning with them, and all of a sudden he knows what to do to shift those feelings from him to the Mithraics. If they want light, he’ll give them light. 

He wishes he could stay and watch the church burn, but he needs to run,  _ now _ . After being imprisoned, it almost feels good to run. It’d feel better if he weren’t being chased by Father, though.


End file.
